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CVE-2026-55088: CWE-200: Exposure of Sensitive Information to an Unauthorized Actor in ether etherpad

0
Medium
Published: 08/19/2026 (08/19/2026, 19:30:20 UTC)
Source: GCVE Database
Vendor/Project: ether
Product: etherpad

Description

Etherpad versions from 2.6.0 up to but not including 3.1.0 contain a vulnerability in the token transfer mechanism. The POST /tokenTransfer endpoint stores author tokens without expiration or removal after use, and the GET /tokenTransfer/{uuid} endpoint exposes these tokens. An unauthenticated attacker with a valid transfer UUID can repeatedly redeem it to obtain fresh author cookies and impersonate the author for pad read and write operations. This issue is fixed in version 3.1.0.

CVSS v3.1

Score 6.8medium

Attack Vector
Network
Attack Complexity
High
Privileges Required
None
User Interaction
Required
Scope
Unchanged
Confidentiality
High
Integrity
High
Availability
None
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:N

Affected software

npmghsa
ep_etherpad-lite
Affected versions
>=2.6.0 <3.1.0

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AI-Powered Analysis

Machine-generated threat intelligence

AILast updated: 09/13/2026, 13:02:24 UTC

Technical Analysis

Etherpad's token transfer feature in versions >=2.6.0 and <3.1.0 uses a POST /tokenTransfer endpoint to store author tokens and a GET /tokenTransfer/{uuid} endpoint to retrieve them. The tokens have no expiration and are not deleted after redemption, allowing an attacker who obtains a transfer UUID to repeatedly redeem it and receive fresh author cookies. This enables unauthorized access to pad content with read and write privileges. The vulnerability is identified as CWE-200 (Exposure of Sensitive Information) and CWE-294 (Authentication Bypass). The flaw is fixed in version 3.1.0.

Potential Impact

An unauthenticated attacker who obtains a valid transfer UUID can repeatedly redeem it to obtain fresh author tokens and cookies, allowing them to impersonate the originating author. This grants unauthorized read and write access to Etherpad collaborative documents, potentially exposing sensitive information and enabling unauthorized modifications.

Mitigation Recommendations

Upgrade Etherpad to version 3.1.0 or later, where this vulnerability is fixed. The fix addresses the lack of expiration and removal of tokens after redemption. No other mitigation is indicated by the vendor advisory.

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Technical Details

Gcve Source
db.gcve.eu
Osv Id
GHSA-vqfp-p66c-xrp9
Osv Schema Version
1.4.0
Aliases
["CVE-2026-55088"]
Ecosystems
["npm"]
Database Specific Severity
MODERATE
Cvss Version
3.1

Threat ID: 6a7e0370bf8831d5398f957e

Added to database: 08/13/2026, 17:48:32 UTC

Last enriched: 09/13/2026, 13:02:24 UTC

Last updated: 09/28/2026, 09:57:42 UTC

Views: 76

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